Re: 'a lost resort' for 'a last resort'

Re: 'a lost resort' for 'a last resort'

After thinking about it for a bit: Substitutions of lost for last and vice versa are to be expected, since both are pronounced [lɑ:st] by many AmE speakers. Can we find more examples, for a future lost«»last entry?

Re: 'a lost resort' for 'a last resort'

[Note, CW: I’m posting this on behalf of Pat Schwieterman, who clicked on “report”. The reason was that, as I learnt only today, users couldn’t post replys to posts. I apologise most humbly—this is not how it was supposed to work. I’ve corrected the configuration. Please reply away.]

Is it really common for speakers of American English to use a nearly identical pronunciation for “last” and “lost”? As a native speaker, I’m a bit surprised, though I’m also rather hesitant to question Chris on anything having to do with English.

Re: 'a lost resort' for 'a last resort'

Pat, you’re giving me too much credit—I’m quite at sea when it comes to American dialects.

Questions to ask: Do you pronounce “god” with the vowel of “father” ([ɑ:])? What about “cot” and “hot”? Then, is it the same for “boss”?

Or does any of those resemble the one you use for “caught” or “all” ([ɔ:]).

My main point was simply that BrE speakers would be very unlikely to merge “last” and “lost”, as the second vowel is unrounded, short and back ([ɒ]). Some have claimed that this vowel doesn’t exist at all in AmE.

Re: 'a lost resort' for 'a last resort'

Chris—my own speech (Western US) might reduce all the a’s and o’s you mention to one sound—I really can’t tell. But for me the “a” of “last/has/flat” etc. stands distinctly apart from all those. Phonology scares me, but I think it’s front and near-open (“a-e ligature” as Anglo-Saxonists say). If I wrote “lost resort,” it would definitely be eggcornish.

Then again, I wouldn’t have predicted that Ken would find 160 hits for “pasterior.” And that probably can’t be explained by a schwa. Maybe I’m less representative in the sound of “last” than I’d’ve thought.